Browse content similar to 07/12/2012. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Tonight, turning crisis into opportunity. Faced with the worst | :00:14. | :00:18. | |
economic conditions in decades, is it time to think big, and downsize | :00:18. | :00:22. | |
the state. If you were starting from scratch, what would the | :00:22. | :00:25. | |
Government control. We ask our radical thinkers how big it should | :00:25. | :00:31. | |
Also tonight, more trouble and strive, the Government wants | :00:31. | :00:35. | |
churches -- strife, the Government want Channel Tunnels to hold gay | :00:35. | :00:41. | |
marriage. What do the Clergy make of this, we ask a couple of members. | :00:41. | :00:48. | |
The map of the Blitz where every red dot marks a bomb. When they | :00:48. | :00:57. | |
walked back home the house had been bombed and they were nowhere to be | :00:58. | :01:02. | |
found. Good evening, you never want a | :01:02. | :01:06. | |
serious crisis to go to waste, Obama's former righthand man, Rahm | :01:06. | :01:10. | |
Emanuel, memorably claimed. Tonight, faced with one of the bleakest | :01:10. | :01:14. | |
outlooks the country has ever faced. We asked what it would take to make | :01:14. | :01:20. | |
a clean start of the crisis. We enter territory we rarely touch, | :01:20. | :01:24. | |
the realms of what if. What if you could start again, to take account | :01:24. | :01:28. | |
of your straitened times, would you roll back Government to its core | :01:28. | :01:35. | |
purpose, if so, what would that be? How would we define our welfare | :01:35. | :01:40. | |
sector, and what would we leave to the private sector. | :01:40. | :01:45. | |
Don't like the state we are in, perhaps we should...start again. Go | :01:45. | :01:49. | |
back to something like a blank sheet of paper. Afterall, it is | :01:49. | :01:55. | |
only 100 years or so Agatha the British state was far smaller. | :01:55. | :02:05. | |
:02:05. | :02:25. | ||
-- or so ago the British state was So how did we get from there to | :02:25. | :02:30. | |
this? The short answer is war. Taylor says the state established a | :02:30. | :02:34. | |
grip over citizens and never let go. That grip has got tighter, given | :02:34. | :02:38. | |
our tight fiscal times, is there a case for deciding what we really | :02:38. | :02:44. | |
need the state to do, and what we can perhaps do without. It is what | :02:44. | :02:47. | |
management consultants call zero- based budgeting. Under the model | :02:47. | :02:52. | |
that we have been pursuing, basically, since World War I, the | :02:52. | :02:56. | |
way the state starts providing private goods increasingly to the | :02:56. | :03:01. | |
population. You have an obvious problem, you will run into proob | :03:01. | :03:05. | |
emblem one day that what has -- a problem one day, that what has been | :03:05. | :03:10. | |
given can't be taken away. You must have free bus passs or TV licenses, | :03:10. | :03:14. | |
or free access to university, then you try to take it away, there is a | :03:14. | :03:18. | |
big kerfuffle, sometimes you can take it away a bit, and sometimes | :03:18. | :03:25. | |
not. This whole system is crazy. There has been plenty written about | :03:25. | :03:29. | |
reducing the state to its core. Economists like Milton Friedman, | :03:29. | :03:35. | |
who won the Nobel Prize, argue that state bureaucracy has not only | :03:35. | :03:39. | |
infant sized citizens, they have a powerful incentive to increase | :03:39. | :03:44. | |
their size and scope. His ideas were so controversial, that even | :03:44. | :03:48. | |
his Nobel ceremony was interrupted by protest. I believe that the | :03:48. | :03:52. | |
essential element of putting Britain on a prosperous track, for | :03:52. | :03:57. | |
a long period of time, is to get the Government reduced in size, and | :03:57. | :04:02. | |
to get rid of Government control over large areas of your economy. | :04:02. | :04:08. | |
Friedman thought you could reduce the role of the state to a few core | :04:08. | :04:11. | |
functions, defence of the nation. We need a mill treatment | :04:11. | :04:14. | |
arbitration of disputes and enforcements of contracts, we need | :04:14. | :04:17. | |
a court service. And protecting the individual from crime against | :04:17. | :04:23. | |
themselves and their property. So we need a police force. And that,, | :04:23. | :04:28. | |
pretty much is it. Of course, that would mean the | :04:28. | :04:31. | |
state withdrawing from areas like health and education. Which, for | :04:31. | :04:35. | |
many, perhaps the majority, is, well, unthinkable. | :04:35. | :04:42. | |
But remember, not that long ago, the majority thought the state was | :04:42. | :04:45. | |
best-placed to build cars and run airlines. Although health and | :04:45. | :04:49. | |
education are vital, are they more vital thaned food. We don't have a | :04:49. | :04:53. | |
national food service. Where state agencies do get involved with food, | :04:53. | :04:58. | |
we get the common agricultural policy, and the result is often | :04:58. | :05:02. | |
criminal waste and more expensive food for the public. The classical | :05:02. | :05:06. | |
liberal views, that the irreducable core of what the state should spent | :05:06. | :05:10. | |
on is public -- spend on is public goods. The classic is street | :05:10. | :05:14. | |
lighting. Once the street lights up everybody can use them, they are | :05:14. | :05:18. | |
non-excludable, as it is put. If people had to buy them privately, | :05:18. | :05:21. | |
there would be an undersupply of them. I won't buy them becausely | :05:21. | :05:24. | |
think you will buy them and I will free ride on you, and you will do | :05:24. | :05:29. | |
the same you force people to buy them through taxation. Public goods, | :05:29. | :05:33. | |
the famous public goods are things like street lighting and maybe | :05:33. | :05:36. | |
rubbish collection, national defence, the rule of law, which | :05:36. | :05:41. | |
comprises of the police and the courts. Some think that modern | :05:41. | :05:45. | |
politics is hastening the day when we have a reduced core state, that | :05:45. | :05:49. | |
so many voters currently benefit from state spending, either as | :05:49. | :05:53. | |
employees or recipients, that any reductions become impossible. | :05:53. | :05:58. | |
Witness the rows this week over the measures contained in the Autumn | :05:58. | :06:01. | |
Statement. That means we will simply carry on borrowing until the | :06:01. | :06:07. | |
markets say enough, and we find ourselves with no alternative, than | :06:07. | :06:12. | |
to contemplate that blank page. With me now is Nassim Nicholas | :06:12. | :06:20. | |
Taleb, author of Black Swan, and the former economic advise Tory | :06:20. | :06:27. | |
George W Bush, and Matthew Taylor. If we were starting from scratch | :06:27. | :06:33. | |
now, you looking in on this country, what would be core purpose and what | :06:33. | :06:37. | |
would be auxiliary? There is a social contract between citizens | :06:37. | :06:42. | |
and their state, the citizens agree to pay taxes in exchange for the | :06:42. | :06:48. | |
state to do certain things. The voice of what the state ought to do | :06:48. | :06:52. | |
will vary from country to country. The French answer to where you draw | :06:52. | :06:57. | |
the line between public and private sector is different from the | :06:57. | :07:01. | |
English answer. Is it to do the economic state the country is in? | :07:01. | :07:05. | |
No it isn't. The Soviet Union discovered is the state can run out | :07:05. | :07:11. | |
of money and cease to exist. We are at a critical moment in the United | :07:11. | :07:13. | |
Kingdom and the United States, and all the indebted countries, where | :07:14. | :07:18. | |
we have to address the question that what is the purpose and role | :07:18. | :07:21. | |
of the function of the state. You can't have a system where the | :07:21. | :07:25. | |
amount of money coming in is less than the amount of money going out, | :07:25. | :07:33. | |
in payments, in benefits, to the public. So we have to be balanced. | :07:33. | :07:39. | |
I'm saying Government has to take in more than it spends or it seass | :07:39. | :07:45. | |
to be able to survive. Give me specific -- Saezs to be able to | :07:45. | :07:50. | |
survive. Give me specifics? Given that everything has to be cut, we | :07:50. | :07:54. | |
don't have enough cash, not here or in the United States to pay for | :07:54. | :07:57. | |
everything promised to the citizens, so we have to put everything. There | :07:57. | :08:02. | |
is no choice, it is not a redistribution argument F you taxed, | :08:02. | :08:07. | |
for example, 1 -- if you taxed, for example, 100% of American citizens' | :08:07. | :08:11. | |
income, we would still have a multigenerational debt problem. It | :08:11. | :08:15. | |
is not a question of redistribution. Everything has to be renegotiated | :08:15. | :08:19. | |
between citizens and state as to who will deliver what. The state is | :08:19. | :08:24. | |
defaulting on the citizen, that is what austerity is. Would you agree | :08:24. | :08:29. | |
that redistribution is way beyond this? I hate to introduce concept | :08:29. | :08:32. | |
actual clarity to the debate, you have to clarify the size of the | :08:32. | :08:35. | |
state, what the state does and regulation by the state. You could | :08:35. | :08:38. | |
have a state that spend as lot of money, but doesn't provide services, | :08:38. | :08:42. | |
or you could have a state that doesn't spend much money or provide | :08:42. | :08:46. | |
services but regulates a lot. There is lots of ways the state | :08:46. | :08:50. | |
influences things. We shouldn't underestimate the way the state | :08:50. | :08:54. | |
changes any way. In the last few years the state has gotten out of | :08:54. | :08:57. | |
the financing of higher education but more money has gone into early | :08:57. | :09:00. | |
years. The state has gone out of the funding of nationalised | :09:00. | :09:04. | |
industries. So actually, over time, what the state does and doesn't do, | :09:04. | :09:07. | |
does actually naturally change. you think we are on the right track, | :09:07. | :09:10. | |
with the examples you have used, do you think this is the right | :09:10. | :09:14. | |
direction of travel? Well, we clearly are going to face some | :09:14. | :09:17. | |
extremely difficult choices, coming up, there is no question about that. | :09:17. | :09:20. | |
Whatever you think the right economic strategy is, we have got a | :09:20. | :09:23. | |
big hole, and we will have to address that hole. That will take | :09:23. | :09:27. | |
some difficult decisions. I think probably, the problem for the | :09:27. | :09:30. | |
coalition at the moment, is it has ring-fenced certain areas, and if | :09:30. | :09:34. | |
it is to be believed, the consequences that large swathes of | :09:35. | :09:40. | |
Government will virtually disappear, in order to defend certain sacred | :09:40. | :09:44. | |
cows, I don't think that is a terribly rational strategy. We are | :09:44. | :09:48. | |
on hypothetical ground, starting with a blank sheet, and saying what | :09:48. | :09:53. | |
should happen? I'm looking, smiling at this debate. The whole entire | :09:53. | :09:57. | |
debate was Milton Friedman's archaic. The point is not the state, | :09:57. | :10:03. | |
it is the private sector, the problem is to do with size. The | :10:03. | :10:08. | |
most successful model in modern history, it is not the nation state. | :10:08. | :10:14. | |
It was created recently, it failed twice in Ancient Egypt and China T | :10:14. | :10:20. | |
started again, a century-and-a-half ago in Europe as an epidemic. The | :10:20. | :10:27. | |
model that has worked is the bottom-up semi-state model. The | :10:27. | :10:31. | |
governance is much better at the local level, city states. When you | :10:31. | :10:35. | |
say city states, I think of Singapore, that can't work across | :10:36. | :10:40. | |
the world? New York is a city state. Switzerland is a bottom-up | :10:40. | :10:45. | |
municiple. These are smaller places? The idea | :10:45. | :10:49. | |
that size matters a lot for more governance than the nature of the | :10:50. | :10:52. | |
political system. That is what people fail to understand. Let me | :10:52. | :10:56. | |
explain, you are top-down, sitting in Whitehall or Washington, and you | :10:56. | :11:01. | |
make a mistake, you have no skin in the game, nobody will know a spread | :11:01. | :11:05. | |
sheet will know about your mistake. It is theoretical. You are a local | :11:05. | :11:08. | |
mayor, you make a mistake, and you are penalised by people around you. | :11:08. | :11:13. | |
Let me add one thing. Let me bring you in at this exact point, the | :11:13. | :11:18. | |
idea of localism and being accountable? I think it is exactly | :11:18. | :11:25. | |
bright, Benjamin Barber is bringing out a book about If Mayors Ruled | :11:25. | :11:30. | |
the World, mayors are more popular than prime ministers and presidents, | :11:30. | :11:35. | |
nation state is too far away. 50 years ago a sociologist famously | :11:35. | :11:38. | |
said in the modern world the state is too big for the small things in | :11:38. | :11:48. | |
:11:48. | :11:49. | ||
life and too big small for the big things in life. It is about how the | :11:49. | :11:52. | |
state operates. My profession is on risk business, you want to know the | :11:52. | :11:57. | |
risk of projects failing, or not being delivered on time and cost | :11:57. | :12:02. | |
overrun and failure to predict, simple. A �100 million project has | :12:02. | :12:07. | |
up to 30% more cost overruns than a �5 billion project. The reason we | :12:08. | :12:13. | |
have size is to save money, you agree, and to make things easier. | :12:13. | :12:17. | |
Size comes with more and more errors errors that can be | :12:17. | :12:21. | |
devastating. If it is that simple, if small things are safer and work | :12:22. | :12:28. | |
better, why do we think so big, why do we talk in big Government? | :12:28. | :12:32. | |
I do think there is an element of once, I think Milton Friedman said, | :12:32. | :12:37. | |
there is nothing so permanent than a temporary Government programme. | :12:37. | :12:41. | |
Once you create something, it is difficult to deconstruct it and | :12:41. | :12:47. | |
take it away. Again, I think the critical issue isn't about the size | :12:47. | :12:53. | |
of Government, it is about balancing how much you bring in, in | :12:53. | :12:57. | |
terms of cash, and how much you are spending. The problem we face in | :12:57. | :13:01. | |
all the industrialised countries is that, since the Second World War, | :13:01. | :13:05. | |
we have been very lucky with demographics, we had baby-boom. The | :13:05. | :13:09. | |
amount of money coming into the system was larger than the amount | :13:09. | :13:13. | |
that needed to be paid out. This demographic has begun to change, | :13:13. | :13:18. | |
and we built all our expectations that we could continue funding with | :13:18. | :13:22. | |
debt permanently, that isn't true. Hang on, we also allowed, over the | :13:22. | :13:26. | |
last 20 or 30 years, a massive increase in inequality, that | :13:26. | :13:31. | |
increase in the level of inequality, is one of the things that fuelled | :13:31. | :13:35. | |
the risks that led to the credit crunch. What leads to the growth of | :13:35. | :13:40. | |
the state is want to go enhance entitlement, there is nothing wrong | :13:40. | :13:46. | |
with that, want ago decent education for every child, and | :13:46. | :13:51. | |
basic healthcare. We have to move to a place where we have basic | :13:51. | :13:55. | |
entitledment but change how they are delivered. Your experience with | :13:55. | :13:58. | |
Tony Blair, you must have had these conversations about what power you | :13:58. | :14:02. | |
let go of, he brought in devolution. But it is very hard for politicians | :14:02. | :14:06. | |
in power to let go? It is hard. And one of the reasons it is hard is | :14:06. | :14:11. | |
because we have, it is not just the state that centralises, the | :14:11. | :14:15. | |
corporate centre is centralised, the media is centralised. Ministers | :14:15. | :14:19. | |
face the problem of going on radio and TV and defending the actions of | :14:19. | :14:22. | |
someone who is operating anywhere in England, because we expect | :14:23. | :14:25. | |
Whitehall to take responsibility for. That one of the things | :14:25. | :14:30. | |
politicians have to get used to, is saying that is not my job any more. | :14:30. | :14:32. | |
I have genuinely devolved responsibility for that. What | :14:32. | :14:38. | |
happens in your model, where every tiny state operates in its own | :14:38. | :14:43. | |
autonomy, what happens when there is failure? The beauty of the | :14:43. | :14:46. | |
bottom-up. Cities go bankrupt, 20 years ago we were talking about | :14:47. | :14:51. | |
cities going bankrupt left, right and centre. The difference is some | :14:51. | :14:54. | |
cities will be successful and some will fail. There will be pressure | :14:54. | :14:59. | |
and competition between them. can't literally have a city where | :14:59. | :15:03. | |
people are living, failing, right? You can manage. New York had to | :15:03. | :15:07. | |
pull out of and and compete. The state can step in for emergencies. | :15:07. | :15:12. | |
We are not arguing that we should let them. You have the safety net | :15:12. | :15:18. | |
of the state. You have to define an emergency? The point is, people | :15:18. | :15:21. | |
mistake interventionism, in regular affairs, micromanaging things, | :15:21. | :15:25. | |
which the state does, and invariably ends up doing, with the | :15:25. | :15:29. | |
being there for emergency room. We need the state for emergencies. We | :15:29. | :15:33. | |
need the state for things that cannot be done locally, for big | :15:33. | :15:36. | |
failures, but we don't need the state to come and tell us how to | :15:37. | :15:41. | |
increase happiness, we need the state to decrease unhappiness. | :15:41. | :15:46. | |
is so easy to get into the hypothetical realm, let's go back | :15:46. | :15:50. | |
to practical issues. I think you will always create a problem, this | :15:50. | :15:54. | |
will be a controversial, if you pay people more to not work than to | :15:54. | :15:58. | |
work. For example, you will always have a problem if you have an | :15:58. | :16:02. | |
environment in which a fireman and a police officer cannot live within | :16:02. | :16:08. | |
an hour of where they work, because prices have gone so far out of | :16:08. | :16:12. | |
control. So there are some basic rules of the game. Whether you are | :16:12. | :16:15. | |
a Conservative or a liberal, it doesn't matter. Again, it just | :16:15. | :16:18. | |
comes down to balance sheet management, and one of the problems | :16:18. | :16:24. | |
we have had, is the Governments are not subject to the same accounting | :16:24. | :16:27. | |
rules as corporations and therefore, they borrow more than they should. | :16:27. | :16:31. | |
It is also true that when the market fails, as it has, | :16:31. | :16:34. | |
disastrously in the last few years, thank God for the state, if it | :16:34. | :16:38. | |
wasn't for the state we would be in the real state of collapse. | :16:38. | :16:42. | |
state causeded it to collapse. You have the state bailing out and | :16:42. | :16:47. | |
allowing something too big to fail. We have run out of time. Should gay | :16:47. | :16:49. | |
marriages be allowed to take place within a church. The Prime Minister | :16:49. | :16:53. | |
has confirmed he wants MPs to vote on legislation, which would allow | :16:53. | :16:56. | |
the ceremonies to be conducted in places of religious worship, no | :16:56. | :16:59. | |
wonder the plans to be set out this week, religious organisations, | :16:59. | :17:04. | |
which do not want to hold these services, will be given legal | :17:04. | :17:12. | |
protection. Guaranteed exemption. It is something that has brought | :17:12. | :17:16. | |
the three main party leaders together. A vow to support the | :17:16. | :17:19. | |
right for gay couples to get married. But there is significant | :17:19. | :17:22. | |
opposition from the Tory backbenches. Perhaps suspecting | :17:22. | :17:28. | |
they are not all likely to honour and obey, David Cameron has | :17:28. | :17:31. | |
promised a free vote on the issue. I'm in favour of gay marriage, | :17:32. | :17:35. | |
because I'm a massive supporter of marriage, and I don't want gay | :17:35. | :17:38. | |
people to be excluded from great institution. | :17:38. | :17:42. | |
Key to the Government's response to the consultation, will be its | :17:42. | :17:45. | |
proposal that churches and other religious institutions can marry | :17:45. | :17:48. | |
gay couples if they wish, but legal protection given to those who | :17:49. | :17:53. | |
prefer to remain exempt. This is unlikely to end the trouble | :17:53. | :17:57. | |
and strife, the consultation period has exposed very public divisions. | :17:57. | :18:01. | |
The Church of England, itself reeling after its synod voted | :18:01. | :18:05. | |
against women bishops, remains firmly opposed to gay weddings, | :18:06. | :18:09. | |
arguing they would lead to the deillusion of marriage. | :18:09. | :18:14. | |
The Government -- deluegs of marriage. The Government hopes to | :18:14. | :18:20. | |
have a vote before Easter, and applying to the statutes before | :18:20. | :18:24. | |
2014, that is assuming the Lords doesn't block it. In which case, | :18:24. | :18:31. | |
the honeymoon may have to just wait. Does the proposed legislation go | :18:31. | :18:39. | |
far enough or too far. We have my guest, one in favour of marriage, | :18:39. | :18:44. | |
and a group committed to the biblical teaching on marriage. | :18:44. | :18:48. | |
Would you be happy to see gay marriages conducted in your church? | :18:48. | :18:53. | |
No, because for two reasons, one, the concept of gay marriage is a | :18:53. | :18:57. | |
contradiction in temples, it is not marriage. It would change -- in | :18:57. | :19:01. | |
terms, it is not marriage, it would change everybody's marriage. We are | :19:01. | :19:04. | |
not interested in protected churches on this. The fact of the | :19:04. | :19:08. | |
matter is marriage is not just something for believers, it is for | :19:08. | :19:10. | |
everybody. We are interested in the issue for the whole of the state. | :19:10. | :19:14. | |
It is interesting, following your recent piece on the size of the | :19:14. | :19:19. | |
state, here we have a Conservative Prime Minister, interfering in the | :19:19. | :19:21. | |
religious beliefs, in fact the religious institutions of a society. | :19:21. | :19:25. | |
This is extraordinary. Let me ask, would you be happy to see any | :19:25. | :19:33. | |
service take place in any church? No, because...This Isn't about a | :19:33. | :19:36. | |
personal church, you think it shouldn't be any church? It is | :19:36. | :19:41. | |
saying, this will be saying that God blesses something, which he | :19:41. | :19:46. | |
clearly teaches, both in creation and in the Bible Bible, he does not | :19:46. | :19:49. | |
bless, it is not -- in the Bible, he does not bless, it is not right. | :19:49. | :19:54. | |
This would come from the synod, you would say the Bible is the top, but | :19:54. | :19:59. | |
in legislative terms, this would be something the synod would oppose, | :19:59. | :20:02. | |
right? The House of Bishops of the Church of England, in response to | :20:02. | :20:05. | |
the Government's consultation, said that they could not support the | :20:05. | :20:13. | |
concept of gay marriage. This won't happen, then? Will it? | :20:13. | :20:18. | |
think marriage will be opened as far as we can see to gay people, as | :20:18. | :20:22. | |
well as straight people in Britain, at some time, in the next few years, | :20:22. | :20:26. | |
maybe as early as 2015. But not in churches? Some churches, because | :20:26. | :20:30. | |
there are churches who believe quite as strongly that they should | :20:30. | :20:33. | |
marry gay people, as there are church that is believe they | :20:33. | :20:36. | |
shouldn't. What would happen to those churches, then, would they be | :20:36. | :20:43. | |
outside the thinking of the rest of the Church of England, what | :20:43. | :20:48. | |
position would these churches who went against that be? You can say | :20:48. | :20:52. | |
people have a right to object to marrying particular people, that is | :20:52. | :20:57. | |
well enshrined in English law, for example, Clergy can object to | :20:57. | :21:01. | |
marrying divorcees, that is the case since the 1920s, there have | :21:01. | :21:09. | |
been provisions for Clergy's consciences since 1907, deceased | :21:09. | :21:13. | |
wives' sisters. You don't need anything in law that protects you, | :21:13. | :21:18. | |
you have always had the right to protect yourself from certain kinds | :21:18. | :21:23. | |
of marriages? On-air I was discussing with maybe of the gay | :21:23. | :21:28. | |
and lesbian transgender movement, who said they would bring cases | :21:28. | :21:32. | |
against churches who wouldn't. This is a red herring, the issue is not | :21:32. | :21:36. | |
whether or not it is in churches, the Government is trying to buy off | :21:36. | :21:39. | |
religious opposition. We will send to every parliamentarian, is there | :21:39. | :21:43. | |
a case for same-sex marriages, and issues of eligibility and | :21:43. | :21:48. | |
consequences next week. It sets out hard social scientific evidence | :21:48. | :21:51. | |
that same-sex marriage, same-sex relationships, formallising them in | :21:52. | :21:58. | |
society is not a good thing for human flourishing. Scientific is a | :21:58. | :22:03. | |
powerful word to use in an argument like this? Extraordinary, there are | :22:03. | :22:06. | |
several jurisdictions in the world where there is marriage equality, | :22:06. | :22:12. | |
the sky hasn't fallen in, in any many of them marriage is stronger, | :22:12. | :22:15. | |
divorce rates have come down in some of them. We don't know what | :22:15. | :22:18. | |
the relationship is, quite honestly there is absolutely no evidence | :22:18. | :22:22. | |
that the sky falls in when you do it. Why not do it tomorrow, if they | :22:22. | :22:24. | |
are always going to oppose it on that side of the church, why would | :22:24. | :22:28. | |
you even wait for the Prime Minister, or the MPs to introduce | :22:28. | :22:33. | |
it? I think, very sadly, the Church of England has a long debate about | :22:33. | :22:36. | |
this, 20, 30, years ago we were thinking seriously about the | :22:37. | :22:42. | |
position of gay people in society, in the 1990, it became politicised, | :22:42. | :22:47. | |
I put my head over the parapet on gay marriage earlier thisy, I have | :22:47. | :22:51. | |
had 500 responses from people, including many Clergy in the Church | :22:51. | :22:54. | |
of England, the overwhelming majority of them are in favour of | :22:54. | :22:57. | |
marriage equality, it is about one in ten weren't, of the responses I | :22:57. | :23:00. | |
got. The interesting ones were people who said we can't talk about | :23:00. | :23:04. | |
it, what we need to do is talk about it. By not having gay | :23:04. | :23:07. | |
marriages in the Church of England for a while, that will give us | :23:07. | :23:17. | |
space to work this one out properly, and look find the rather infatanile | :23:17. | :23:22. | |
terms it has been talked about. you worried about getting left | :23:22. | :23:25. | |
behind and making yourself irrelevant, if the vast majority of | :23:25. | :23:28. | |
people have moved on, on this issue? The Church of England has | :23:28. | :23:32. | |
never set its doctrine by public opinion poll or popularity. It has | :23:32. | :23:36. | |
changed it? What has changed it? has changed, for example, whether | :23:37. | :23:40. | |
it will marry people who have had sex before marriage, whether it | :23:40. | :23:44. | |
will, as the examples were given, brothers of the dead brothers and | :23:44. | :23:48. | |
all the rest of it, these things do move on? That is all within the | :23:48. | :23:53. | |
concept of woman and man as the fundamental components of marriage. | :23:53. | :23:57. | |
Why should that be a stronger definition than any of other | :23:57. | :24:01. | |
examples? The evidence is, the evidence is that for human | :24:01. | :24:04. | |
flourishing, for providing children with the rights to have a mother | :24:04. | :24:10. | |
and a father, for the best context for both children being reared, and | :24:10. | :24:13. | |
also for long-term. Real marriage ensures the future. The evidence is | :24:14. | :24:18. | |
that if you want to have a life- long committed same-sex | :24:18. | :24:24. | |
relationship, hold on, hold on. don't mind marrying older people | :24:24. | :24:29. | |
who might not pro-create? If you have that, then non-monogamous | :24:29. | :24:32. | |
same-sex relationships are much more continuous than if you are | :24:33. | :24:37. | |
monogamous, it is different for marriage. You asked me then, | :24:37. | :24:41. | |
another question, which was? If it is about procreation, why don't you | :24:41. | :24:44. | |
mind marrying older people who aren't having children? Because, | :24:44. | :24:49. | |
two reasons, it is pro-creative in principle, and secondly, they can | :24:49. | :24:58. | |
still be a mother and father to children. The using phrase "equal" | :24:58. | :25:02. | |
it changes marriage for everyone. have discovered there are gay | :25:02. | :25:07. | |
couples in Britain, living together in fruitful, joyful relationships, | :25:07. | :25:12. | |
sometimes for 20, 30 years, which entirelyly mirror the Christian | :25:12. | :25:15. | |
virtues of marriage. As far as marriage being gendered, that is a | :25:15. | :25:19. | |
strand of Christian teaching on marriage, not exclusively so. In | :25:19. | :25:22. | |
the Bible the church is described as the bride of Christ, that | :25:22. | :25:25. | |
doesn't mean all Christians are female, it doesn't mean they have | :25:25. | :25:31. | |
to have sex, and who are the kids? It reduces it to be absurdity to | :25:31. | :25:36. | |
say it is engendered in that way, it shouldn't be now. I disagree. | :25:36. | :25:38. | |
Thank you for coming in if and talking about it. | :25:38. | :25:46. | |
It is called, compellingly, bomb site.org, an interactive -- | :25:47. | :25:51. | |
bombsite.org, an interactive map that illustrates where each bomb | :25:51. | :25:58. | |
fell in the blits and how the city was affected. The bliplts, which | :25:58. | :26:02. | |
killed thousands and destroyed more than a million homes. This map | :26:02. | :26:06. | |
pieces together the targeting, with photos and the history that arose | :26:06. | :26:16. | |
from it. They accumulate and cluster, as | :26:16. | :26:22. | |
though in an unwanted finding on a medical chart. In fact, this is the | :26:22. | :26:27. | |
pathology of London during the Blitz. Each red dot represents a | :26:27. | :26:32. | |
bomb site. Take a suburban street like Pember Road in Kensal Rise, in | :26:32. | :26:38. | |
the North West of theAl. The new website records that -- of the | :26:38. | :26:41. | |
capital. The new website records that Nazi bombers struck here. The | :26:41. | :26:46. | |
houses all looked like this, except here, where number 24 used to be. | :26:46. | :26:51. | |
have a couple of pictures here of Ivy. My cousin was left in the | :26:51. | :26:56. | |
house, at the age of 16, very responsible lady. And the parents, | :26:56. | :27:03. | |
my uncle and aunt, went out, probably to the Kilburn Empire, | :27:03. | :27:10. | |
which they used to frequent, had a lovely evening. When they walked | :27:10. | :27:17. | |
back home, the house had been bombed. Ivy was nowhere to be found. | :27:18. | :27:25. | |
But she was found some while later, she had been, the house had | :27:25. | :27:27. | |
suffered pretty well a direct hit and she was blown to piece. This is | :27:27. | :27:33. | |
the sad thing, she was just at the age where she had young men taking | :27:33. | :27:38. | |
an interesting. It all just disappeared like that. | :27:38. | :27:42. | |
Thick smoke hangs over the heart of Britain, as a choking dawn reveals | :27:42. | :27:47. | |
the terrors of the night. London has been wounded during the hours | :27:47. | :27:57. | |
:27:57. | :27:58. | ||
of darkness, what colossal strength runs in her veins news reals of the | :27:58. | :28:03. | |
blits shows the landmarks. There is a lot of misconceptions about the | :28:03. | :28:08. | |
Blitz, that it was mainly aimed at the East End of London, it was | :28:08. | :28:13. | |
terribly badly hit there, it was the dock, and the infrastructure in | :28:13. | :28:17. | |
the place. It hit the west just as hard. There were 20,000 people | :28:17. | :28:24. | |
killed, predominantly in the East End, but the leafy, outer suburbs | :28:24. | :28:30. | |
were hit too. Causing devastation and terror, that was the motive of | :28:30. | :28:34. | |
the Germans, to intell fear into that population. | :28:34. | :28:42. | |
-- Instill fear into the population. Each red dot of the map, is a sign | :28:42. | :28:49. | |
of something perishable,ry. We used to play in the bombed -- Memory. | :28:49. | :28:53. | |
used to play in the bombed buildings, when I think we used to | :28:53. | :28:57. | |
go up rafters with bits missing. I recall a house, we must have passed | :28:57. | :29:03. | |
there the day after it had been bombed. It was a most extraordinary | :29:03. | :29:05. | |
sight. There was a policeman standing outside, I recall, and | :29:06. | :29:10. | |
debris in the road. And the whole of the front of the house had been | :29:10. | :29:20. | |
:29:20. | :29:20. | ||
blown off. And there was a bed hanging out into the road. | :29:20. | :29:24. | |
website will excavate war time from the rubble of history for a new | :29:24. | :29:30. | |
begin raise, or so some hope. -- Generation, or so some hope. | :29:30. | :29:34. | |
lot of young people are interested in the world war, because they are | :29:34. | :29:37. | |
part of the key stage programmes, anything that shows people a little | :29:37. | :29:41. | |
bit more, uncovers the archaeology of London, or any other city, is | :29:42. | :29:44. | |
very, very valuable. It is interesting, people always say, the | :29:44. | :29:48. | |
Second World War, people are obsessed with that, you know, can't | :29:48. | :29:54. | |
we have closure. If I said to you, I'm going to take you to a plague | :29:54. | :29:59. | |
pit, you wouldn't say, for goodness sake can't we get over the 16th | :29:59. | :30:04. | |
century, can't we move on. website, and a forth coming app to | :30:04. | :30:13. | |
go with it, are new tools for joining the dots of history. | :30:13. | :30:16. | |
Review is up next. Matter that is in Glasgow. | :30:16. | :30:22. | |
In the last book special of the year, we will be marking the 50th | :30:22. | :30:27. | |
anniversary of A Clockwork Orange, and also looking at a book about00 | :30:27. | :30:30. | |
years of film censorship, which includes Kubrick's controversial | :30:30. | :30:34. | |
film. There is a new novel from the creator of Reginald Perrin, another | :30:34. | :30:38. | |
posthumous publication from David Foster Wallace, and the latest | :30:38. | :30:42. | |
collection from Oliver Sachs, the world's favourite neurologist, | :30:42. | :30:48. | |
which he calls an anthology of hallucinations! That is all from | :30:48. | :30:52. | |
Newsnight. We leave you with a view from the earth as seen by NASA's | :30:52. | :30:56. | |
newest satellite, back down to earth on Monday. | :30:56. | :31:03. |